By Caroline Herbert, Arts and Culture Reporter
The Fiber Arts Collective event was supposed to take place at Virginia Tech’s Perspective Gallery on Tuesday, Feb. 11, but was cancelled due to snow.
Why It Matters: Events like the Fiber Collective at Virginia Tech are important because they bring students together that have similar passions and interest, to create a community. But when obstacles like weather get in the way of doing so, all those involved must adapt.
The Big Picture: Virginia Tech’s decision to close schools due to the snow on both Feb. 11 and 12 not only affected classes and regular activities, but also planned events scheduled for these days.
- Virginia Tech’s statement on their website: “Due to inclement weather, the Virginia Tech campus in Blacksburg will be closed on Tuesday, Feb. 11, 2025. All Blacksburg campus in-person classes and activities are canceled for Tuesday.”
- Examples of events this effected: Beginner bowling tournament, Financial Wellness Workshop, movie night at the student center, and the School of Communication Professors Q & A
Zoom In: Olivia Coutre, Art Program Coordinator for Student Engagement and Campus Life, works with Studio 72. Coutre designed and facilitates the Fiber Art Collective Program and the weekly events that take place.
- About Fiber Art Collective: Fiber Art Collective is one of the “crafternoon” events among others such as Watercolor Wednesday and pop-up programs in Johnston Student Center on Thursdays.
- This week’s event was supposed to be in a similar format to previous weeks.
- “We do everything from crocheting, knitting, punch needling, embroidery, hand-sewing, needle felting, and I also just introduced some weaving,” said Coutre. “I am available to help teach them any of the projects that they want to start but don’t know how to do yet.”
- “Typically, we have a pretty good group of returning students that come every week, and then we’ll have a few new students that will show up,” said Coutre.
How they adapted: Although Coutre says they are bummed that this week’s event fell on a snow day, she said they found ways to adapt to the circumstances.
- “People were sharing updates on their projects through a group me that one of the students started, which was a nice alternative if we couldn’t meet.” said Coutre, “I encouraged people to work on their projects on the snowy day.”
Zoom Out: Beyond the Fiber Art Collective, there were many other events that were affected by the snow cancellations. On Tuesday, Feb. 11 there was supposed to be a School of Communication Professors Q and A.
- Emma Duncan, Society of Professional Journalists (SPJ) member who has been
playing a role in the planning of the School of Communication Professors Q and A, shares her experience with the event cancellations in Blacksburg. Originally supposed to be on Feb. 4, this event has been through a long planning process due to the room and professor availability. With the rescheduled date being Feb. 11, the snow cancellation date, they are having to reschedule once again. Duncan and others involved with the planning of this event decided to move it to Tuesday, Feb 18, on zoom to avoid any further rescheduling due to weather in the future. - Duncan shares that for SPJ, this type of cancellation is unusual.
- “With planning any event, you never really think about weather because most of the events we do for our club are indoors. Our biggest challenges are normally scheduling guests to come,” said Duncan “It was the first time we’ve had to reschedule for weather.”
- Duncan is adapting with a positive mindset. “We’re hoping zoom might even bring out more attendance,” said Duncan.
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